


The Copper Bowl

by telepathy



Series: The Castle & The Rose [6]
Category: Beauty and the Beast (2017)
Genre: Angst, Budding companionship, Caring Belle, Comfort, Curiosity, Expanded Scenes, F/M, Forbidden themes, Missing Scenes, No judgements
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-12
Updated: 2017-04-12
Packaged: 2018-10-18 01:34:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10606557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/telepathy/pseuds/telepathy
Summary: Beast is wounded & Belle tends to him. - Expanded scene! -





	

I wake to a cacophony of hushed voices and warmth. The chatter drops another length as my eyes slowly come round to opening; I know there will be time to discuss what’s happened, but my strength is already waning and fighting the need to rest seems a losing battle. 

My eyes wander about the room: Belle is sat by my side, her hands grasping a drink of some sort – she appears calm, quietly focused on…me. Then there’s Lumiere, Mrs Potts, and the regular crew nearer to the end of my grandiose bed, watching, waiting. 

I feel around my person and notice the tattered robes I live within have been…removed? In the time between arriving to the castle and being put into my current position of comfort, I was stripped and redressed into bedclothes. Idly I wonder who did the switching. Silently I wish it wasn’t the girl.

For her to see more of _me_ brings a shudder to mind; I’m horrendous enough as it is.

“…Would you like a sip of water?” 

Belle’s tone is even, unforced, and my heart lightens at the prospect that she’s no longer upset with me. 

Wholly unaware, I nod a muted ‘yes’ to her easy question; “Can you sit up any?” My brain immediately knows this to be a less easy request. But before I have the chance to respond, her hand is coddling the nape of my neck, an attempt to tilt my head forwards, chin-down. I help her. There’s a small glass wrapped in her tiny, sure hands and but I’m not looking at that right now. 

I’m looking at her. She’s nearer to me than anyone has ever been, her face so close that the fur on my cheeks is warmed by her breath. “Drink.” 

Mesmerized, I’m frozen solid by what she’s stirred in me: she is touching me – Belle is here with me and not the least bit fearful. Doesn’t she know, can’t she see? I’m not a man, not a familiar face in any sense of the word. 

I gulp and swallow the cool liquid and my eyes roll involuntarily. The fresh water tastes like summer, or perhaps spring, and I know this is because of her. Belle isn’t winter cold, or hardened by the passage of years spent alone, stalking the earth like a night-creature that has no name. 

She’s–“…Very good. Would like more?” 

I shake my head harder than necessary and a horn gets caught in the edge of a pillowcase. She laughs and I stir uncomfortably. The hand that left from me moments before returns to shift the soft linen and malleable feather-down headrest out of the way. “This happens a lot, I imagine?” 

I look away, gaze directed towards a half-opened window and nod, “Sometimes, but I don’t sleep in here all that often.” 

She sits back onto one of her legs and the distance it brings is dreadfully painful. 

_Oh, right. Pain._

The wounds of my arm, shoulder and leg begin to pulsate, as if they had been torn open all over again. “Here, let me.” The girl places the glass on the bedside table and removes a soaking-wet cloth from the insides of a copper bowl. She leans over and across my chest to dab at my right arm, but I pull away at the last second. 

Despite my hasty efforts, water droplets still found purchase, falling into the sheared slices; I growl low in my throat and turn my head away, “that hurts!” 

“If you hold still, it wouldn’t hurt as much.” 

“Well, if you hadn’t run away, this wouldn’t have happened!” 

“If you hadn’t frightened me, I wouldn’t have run away!”

“Well, _you_ shouldn’t have been in the west wing!”

“Well, you should learn to control your temper.” 

Silence descends upon the room and rashly, I roll away from her; this effectively offers her my wounded shoulder on a silver platter, but I trust her not to intentionally harm me. In the quiet, I concede that she’s right. I won’t tell her that in so many words, but Belle is intelligent enough to know when she’s won an argument. 

I hear beads of water drip-drop on the linen behind me but do not feel the press of any cloth. My eyes begin to close and I want to fade away with the enchantment of sleep, to dream human dreams–

“Do you need anything else?” 

Her words are softly-spoken, not abrasive or argumentative as they were only moments before. 

I turn in time to see my servants depart but Belle remains. Her eyes are warm, kind. “No, I’m alright.” 

A pregnant pause encapsulates the space between us.

“Earlier, what did you mean when you said, ‘does she think me a beast, or man?’” 

My eyes fall from hers – I cannot explain myself out of this one with anger and intimidation. “I was…delirious, didn’t realize what I was saying. I’m tired and I’d like to sleep now.”

She stands and just as I thought she might be leaving the room, leaving me, she doesn’t; Belle merely changed positions to be on the opposite side of my mattress. The side I’m facing. 

Settling in the center of the kingly bed-set to gain a better view of me, she wastes no time: “Sleep will come. Please, what did you _mean?_ I know you were man at some point in your life. I’ve seen the torn paintings of a youth with the bluest eyes. Like yours.” 

Beast sighs and rolls onto his back, wincing at the sudden bite of pain that cuts through him. That hurt will take some time to dissipate, of that he’s certain. But what she poses to him now is a hurt that could last a lifetime. 

“Well, there you have it then, I _was_ a man.”

Belle leans towards him, “And are you a man still?” It’s a genuine question, but instead of pure curiosity, he only hears the same hushed judgements as always. 

A faint, low rumble billows somewhere in the depths of his chest and he struggles to fight it. “Do I look like a man to you? Is this what men look like to _you?_ I’d hate to see the village you’re from if that’s the case.” 

Pinching her eyebrows, Belle frowns and slides herself from the bed, saying nothing as she goes. She’s upset, again. He’s done that to her, again. 

“Thank you for not leaving me to the wolves.” 

She halts at the stately mahogany, her hand pausing as it clutches the doorknob, “I’d never let a man get torn apart by a pack of beasts.”

Belle says nothing else as she leaves him to his slumber. 

But he’s wide awake now.

**Author's Note:**

> And another. Hope these are still alright expansions? I'm trying to push a new one out everyday, so send a bit of luck to my brain? x


End file.
